For the second time in a row, Virginia senior Kate Douglass has won the CSCAA’s Women’s Swimmer of the Year award, while Virginia head coach Todd DeSorbo won his third-straight swimming coach of the year award. On the diving side, it was UNC’s Aranza Vazquez who was named diver of the year, and her coach Yaidel Gamboa won diving coach of the year. All CSCAA awards are decided based on votes by Division I swimming and diving head coaches who are members of the CSCAA.
Douglass earned her award by posting one of the greatest NCAA championship performances in history, winning and breaking NCAA records in the 2o0 IM (1:48.37), 100 fly (48.46), and 200 breast (2:01.29). She also helped Virginia to wins in the 200 free relay, 400 free relay, 200 medley relay, and 400 medley relay, with the 200 medley and 400 free relay victories being done in NCAA record fashion. Meanwhile, DeSorbo lead Virginia to their third-straight NCAA team championship, and his third in his five total seasons of coaching at Virginia.
Vazquez was the only diver to win multiple NCAA titles this year, taking first in the one-meter and three-meter events. She also scored a tenth-place finish in the platform event. Her and her coach Gamboa are the first UNC-affiliated individuals to ever receive a CSCAA athlete or coach of the year award.
In addition, the CSCAA also named 133 athletes as first-team All-Americans (given to everyone who finishes 1st through 8th in an individual event or relay), and 107 athletes as second-team All-Americans (given to everyone who finishes 9th through 16th).
This was about as competitive as an elephant in the sky
if Gretchen had had better reaction times, she’d be looking at 3 wins and 3 NCAA records instead of 2 wins and 1 record. Would still go to Douglass realistically- I would say her 200 IM time is approximately equal to Walsh’s 100 back, but 48.46 100 fly and 2:01.2 200 breast beats out a 20.7 50 free and 45.5 100 free probably.
Schnell should have been diver of the year. 2nd, 4th, 1st is better than 1st, 1st, 10th. 52 vs 47 points and 1043.5 vs 1029.7 for combined scores from the 3 boards. Didn’t drop an f-bomb so maybe suffered on the voting there. #divedove
Deservedly so!